France

Three hours into our week in Paris, we realized that our trip would be completely centered around several things we were completely deprived of in Chiang Mai: Cheese, Bread, Wine, and Sidewalks. Luckily, we walked enough on sidewalks to compensate for the obscene amount of cheese, bread and wine we were consuming each day. Nothing says “time to move back home” like “outgrowing” all the clothes you have with you…

So why did we go to Paris? In a nutshell, my dad is a Rotary fanatic and is super involved in the youth exchange programs. Recently they became good friends with the Barbé family, because Zoé did a yearlong exchange in the town where my parents live. Because of my parents involvement Rotary Youth Exchange, I have “siblings” all over the world, people who have stayed with or have become very close with my family during their year in the USA. The Barbé family is one of those wonderful families, and they have an apartment in Paris where they very generously let us stay for a week! It. Was. Amazing.

Here we are with Zoé at the Paris Airport!

Enough with the background, let’s talk about the food!

Cheese

Anyone who has ever traveled to Southeast Asia can back me up when I say that the cheese there is just so, so sad. I ordered a ham and cheese panini at a cafe in Chiang Mai once, and I am 99% sure they used Easy Cheese to make it. Even the American Cheese slices are expensive and just melt into a gooey mess the moment you take them out of the wrapper. The fancy import grocery store stocks great imported cheeses, but they’re absurdly expensive. That didn’t keep me from window shopping, though. Whenever we visited the Rimping Market, I would lust over the fancy cheese while Kevin stood drooling over the imported beers. Sigh. That was a big event for us on weekends.

Enter Paris. The Barbé Family gave us SUCH an awesome welcome the night we arrived. Check out the spread they laid out:

There are no less than TWELVE types of cheese in this photo. TWELVE.

There are so many things in that photo that make me so happy. Aside from 12 types of cheese (obviously, we tried every single type), there is a wonderful bottle of bordeaux, delicious foie gras (where have you been all my life, foie gras…), and two types of bread.

We also went out for a lot of cheesey dishes. One day we got French Onion Soup, which we learned is just called “Onion Soup” when you’re in France:

Onion Soup, Topped with Cheesey Goodness

We also got a Croque Madame. If you’ve never heard of one of those before, it’s basically a Grilled Cheese sandwich on steroids (it even has ham!), topped with a fried egg. Are you salivating? I am too:

Croque Madame. Highgly Recommend.

Bread

Here’s Kevin with a baguette and a chocolate croissant. This bakery was just a 5-minute walk from the apartment, but we definitely ate the croissant before we got home…

I don’t even know how to describe the bread culture in France in a way that does it justice. It is probably the best thing I have ever encountered in any culture I have ever experienced, ever. There are Boulangeries located all over the city, and locals tend to go out every morning to get fresh bread for the day. (Sidenote: Boulangerie is the French word for bakery.) Bakers typically go to school for three years before opening up a boulangerie. THREE YEARS!

So Many Baguette Options! This is Chanterelle Bakery.

Another photo at Chanterelle. Their croissants are so so so good…

When we were in Paris, we adhered to our do-as-the-locals-do mantra, and went to a boulangerie each morning. We tried croissants, croissants with butter, chocolate croissants, baguettes, “traditional” (more rustic) baguettes, bread with dried fruit and nuts in it, and the Barbés introduced us to the best type of bread known to human beings: viennoise. It’s a hybrid between brioche and a typical baguette, and it is the best thing since, well, sliced bread. The kicker? There is also a viennoise variety with chocolate chips baked into it!

There’s nothing like a big plate o’ croissants.

More Bakery Goodness

Each morning, we enjoyed a traditional French breakfast of fresh baguettes with butter and jam. The best part is that you dip your buttered and jammed bread in milk before each bite! Try that at home, readers, it’s a little piece of paradise.

French Breakfast! The Viennoise bread is 2nd from the bottom.

If jam isn’t sweet enough for you, there are also macaroons:

Delicious Wonderful Macaroons. So Buttery and Wonderful…

If you’re not into macaroons (you might not enjoy them if you don’t like butter, in which case we should not be friends), there’s definitely a dessert for you. Look at this madness:

So much amazing cake in one place…

So many cookies to choose from!

Wine

We did our best in Paris to drink all the wine we could get our hands on, focusing on bordeaux, which typically costs north of $25/bottle in the US. In France, it’s easy to find a great bottle for just five bucks. We were only in Paris for 6 nights, but we took down 5 bottles of wine. We are champs.

We made dinner one night in Paris. The star of the show was another bordeaux. This one cost us just north of 2 euro. I love a good bargain, especially on wine!

Don’t worry, we weren’t just drunk the whole time we were in Paris. We drank other things too, like incredibly adorable tiny cups of espresso:

I felt like a giant holding such an adorably tiny cup of espresso.

Sidewalks

In Thailand, sidewalks are not sacred pedestrian areas. I’m not sure I’d even call them “pedestrian areas” at all, actually. Most “sidewalks” in Chiang Mai are riddled with uneven pavers that turn into what we call “gushers” after a rain storm. If you step on a gusher after it rains, then warm, muddy, gritty water might shoot up your leg. Fun, right? If you’re not worrying about gushers, you’re trying not to trip on random uneven sidewalk edges, or you’re avoiding advertising signs that have been erected in such a way that it blocks 98% of the sidewalk. I’ve seen loose electrical wires dangling in pedestrian paths, as well as random wires sticking out at eye-level from telephone poles. And the very best part is that it’s actually not at all uncommon for motorbikes to park and drive on the sidewalks. For months, I’ve been saying that I’m going to walk so hard on sidewalks once we move back to a more pedestrian-friendly culture. Here’s Kevin basking in the glory of a wide, wonderful sidewalk:

WE LOVE SIDEWALKS. Here’s Kevin, taking up as much room on a sidewalk as humanly possible.

We did a lot of walking in Paris, which is our favorite way to experience a city, even if it’s the middle of winter. Here’s a run-down of some of the sights we saw while we were exploring:

We Visited Notre Dame

A fun view of Notre Dame from just down the Seine River.

Kevin and Notre Dame.

Can you find me in this photo with Notre Dame?

At Notre Dame, you can feed the birds! Put a piece of bread in your hand and they’ll fly right up for it! There is so much joy in this photo – look at all those smiles, especially on the kid!

Kevin dressed in colors to match the Notre Dame Christmas Tree.

I sneakily took one photo inside Notre Dame. Who can resist with beautiful stained glass like this?!

Beautiful Notre Dame

Montmartre and Sacre Cœur

We visited Sacre Cœur, a Catholic Church located on top of Montmartre Hill.

The wonderful view from the steps of Sacre Cœur.

A harpist was playing on the steps!

There was also a band playing near a Sacre Cœur side door. I loved the impromptu music all over Paris!

Another view of Sacre Cœur.

Montmartre is one of the most fun neighborhoods to explore in Paris. Here’s Kevin, at the very top.

Look how cute Montmartre is! I could live here.

One thing I love about Paris? Even though it’s winter, people still eat outside in the sunshine.

Someone put a clown nose on this statue in Montmartre. Hooligans.

The La Marais Neighborhood

This quickly became our favorite neighborhood in Paris! These photos show why:

We stood in a crazy line to get food from L’As du Fallafel, which translates to The Ace of Falafel.

It was worth it. The Falafel was incredible.

Great music on Sundays in the La Marais neighborhood!

I Became Obsessed with Doors

Paris just has the most beautiful doors ever. Period. I quickly became obsessed with them, which I know is a bit weird…

This one was my favorite.

And here’s Kevin making fun of my obsession.

This one still had up its Christmas decorations!

So so beautiful.

The Louvre

Confession time. We looked at the outside of the Louvre, but didn’t go in. I mean, check out these lines:

Crazy lines at the Louvre!

A plaza at the Louvre.

I took this door photo at the Louvre, and Kevin made me zoom out and re-take it because he felt that the nude statues really gave the photo some extra oomph. That guy on the right is totally naked, but he’s being so casual about it.

The Louvre pyramids.

And here is Kevin walking on water at the Louvre, because he can do that now.

L’Arc de Triomphe

Here’s Kevin making his triumphant pose at the Arch of Triumph.

It’s free on the first Sunday of each month! We climbed all of these stairs to get some fun night views from the top.

The night view from the top of L’Arc de Triomphe.

L’Arc de Triomphe

The Local Market

There was a morning market on Saturday near the apartment. We are suckers for local farmers markets, so we made sure to go!

Ready to eat food, we grabbed some ratatouille for lunch.

This is the block-of-cheese-the-size-of-your-head section.

Mussels

Seafood!

Huge veggie and fruit variety.

Fresh Pasta!

Beautiful flowers at the market.

Did we get crepes? You Betcha! We had a delicious caramel one at the market. We also tried a sugar and lemon crepe, and a butter, cinnamon and sugar crepe. The Cinnamon one won, hands down.

Other Paris Sights

Hôtel de Ville, Paris’ City Hall, has an ice skating rink out front during the winter!

We saw this once in Seattle. Apparently parents in Paris let their kids play inside giant plastic bubbles, too. This was at a pop-up carnival near the Bastille.

Here I am at the square near the Bastille. This was right near the carnival.

After walking down Montmartre hill, we found ourselves in a seedy neighborhood with lots of adult shops. I realized, “Hey, we must be near the Moulin Rouge!” Sure enough, we were just 2 blocks away. Here I am, practicing my kicks for the burlesque show. Nailed it.

We stumbled upon the lock bridge near the Louvre. Couples get a padlock, write their names and the date on it, and lock it on the bridge as a symbol of their love. We figured we’d skip it – who needs a symbol of love when you already have a mortgage together, AMIRITE?!

We walked over lots of Siene River Bridges.

Sunset in Paris

We accidentally saved our Eiffel Tower daytime visit for a day with a low cloud cover. Oops. As consolation, here’s a nude statue with the Eiffel Tower.

The Beautiful Eiffel Tower

A New Years Celebration

We went with Zoé and her friends to the Eiffel Tower to count down the seconds until 2015!

The last photo we took in 2014.

We were so glad the Barbés loaned us coats for our week in Paris! Otherwise we would’ve rung in the new year with frostbite. At midnight, the Eiffel Tower sparkled with strobe lights, and unofficial fireworks were set off all over the city. It was a fun way to ring in the new year, but I’m not sure I’d recommend it to everyone. The crowds at the Metro (Paris’ Subway System) afterwards were the closest thing I’ve ever experienced to a riot:

This picture doesn’t even come close to conveying the crowded craziness after midnight! I only took my phone out once we were on the platform, out of the biggest crowds. It was a lot better up here, because policemen were only letting a certain number of people through the subway station entrance at a time.

Our advice? Get a hotel in the city so you don’t need to use public transit after the clock strikes midnight!

We Want to Hear From You!

We’re going to be here in Europe for the next 4 months. Do you have any cold-weather destination suggestions? We’re all ears.